Discuss Dimmer switch light fixture problem in the Lighting Forum area at ElectriciansForums.net

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C

CorpusCallosum

Hi all,

I've just moved into a rental house and am having a nightmare figuring out what type of light bulb to use in the ceiling fixture in one of the upstairs rooms.

The bulb that's in the fixture now works, although does not dim (if I turn the dial at the wall). It also happens to be a very dim bulb, and I want a brighter one so I took it out. I tried replacing it with an 'old-style' 40W bulb (said 'dimmable' on the box), and 105W halogen bulb (also 'dimmable'). Neither of these worked at all, but they do when I screw them into other fixtures in the house. I tried another bulb that was lying around, that one flashed at about 1Hz and didn't seem to change frequency when I turned the dimmer dial. It also worked normally in another fixture.

How on earth do I figure out what kind of bulb is the right bulb? I don't have the box of the bulb that was in the fixture originally so I can't even get the same one again (which I wouldn't want to anyway as it's not bright enough). Can anyone help?

Thanks in advance!
 
A 40W old style filament lamp should work on pretty much most dimmers.
It sounds somewhat like the dimmer module has failed, and needs replacing.
 
Any dimmer should be able to dim successfully an incandescent bulb i.e. a old style filament or an "eco" halogen bulb. However if the dimmer has a minimum load that is greater than the bulb wattage (often the minimum load is 60W) then it may not work.

It is possible that the lamp holder is slightly damaged and so a new bulb may not make contact with the lampholder terminals.

SJD has the most likely scenario, that the dimmer switch is faulty.
Trying the various bulbs with just a plate switch would check if the lampholder is faulty.
Trying a new dimmer switch would check if the dimmer is faulty.
 

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